I don’t believe it. I saw him at the B.A.T. dinner and he didn’t look like he lost 30 pounds to me. Maybe half that amount. We haven’t weighed him so I don’t now where that number comes from. He obviously has worked very hard to rehab his knee and he’s lost some weight, but he’s still around 300 pounds. Clearly, he’s a tremendous athlete and he can handle it , but it has to be managed so it doesn’t become a problem. I just think 30 pounds would have been a lot more noticeable.

As a longtime fatso who has shed 30-plus pounds on numerous occasions over the years, I can tell you from experience that it’s almost impossible to eyeball whether someone as big as Sabathia has lost 15 pounds or 30 pounds (or, for that matter, gained 15 pounds or 30 pounds). Once you get to be that size–and my guess is Sabathia is well over his listed weight of 307 pounds–the random weight fluctuations are pretty huge and you can easily drop 20-30 pounds in a very limited amount of time.

In other words, Cashman probably can’t accurately gauge Sabathia’s weight just by looking at him wearing a suit at a charity event and someone as big as Sabathia losing 30 pounds in an offseason really isn’t such an impressive feat anyway. I could easily lose 30 pounds by the end of the month. You know, if I wasn’t so lazy and didn’t like Chinese food so much.

Also of note is that this continues Cashman’s offseason-long pattern of saying more and more outspoken things in the media for seemingly no good reason. It started with the Derek Jeter negotiations and extended to telling everyone that he was forced to sign Rafael Soriano for $35 million, and now he’s basically saying “eh, Sabathia still looks like a fatso” following reports that the Yankees’ ace tried to get into better shape.

I’m not complaining, of course, because an outspoken Cashman is a whole lot of fun for guys like me. I’m just not sure what he and the Yankees stand to gain from it. Or maybe I’m just so used to the general manager of my beloved Twins refusing to say anything of interest through the media, ever, that it only seems weird for Cashman to be so open. Or maybe I’m just ornery because I haven’t eaten in a while.

Jon Heyman of FanRag Sports reports Thursday that the Orioles “are said to have begun fielding calls of interest” on superstar Manny Machado and “are close to the point of seriously weighing whether to trade him.”

You’d think it would be a no-brainer for the last-place O’s to flip Machado — an impending free agent — for prospects, but Heyman notes there is “still a question whether or not longtime Orioles owner Peter Angelos” will give the go-ahead. One person familiar with the situation put it a “50-50” likelihood. Another suggested that it would take a massive return, which, sure.

Machado entered play Thursday with a sensational .328/.405/.635 batting line, 15 home runs, and an MLB-leading 43 RBI in 49 games. It’d be a real shock if he’s still wearing an O’s uniform by the end of July.

Heyman reported previously that at least nine teams made aggressive plays for Machado this winter, including the Cubs, Phillies, Dodgers, Indians, Diamondbacks, Yankees, Red Sox, White Sox, and Cardinals. A whole lot of those teams still make sense here in late May — maybe all of them except the White Sox.